Bumble app's paying users fell 15% and Tinder's payers 4% in the third quarter as Hinge and Grindr grew

Three dating-app companies have now reported the three months to September 30, and their paying customers are moving in different directions. Match Group said on November 2 that Tinder's Payers fell 4% to 8.9 million, while Hinge's rose 23% to 2.3 million. Bumble Inc. said in a quarterly report filed on November 4 that Bumble App Paying Users fell 15.1% to 2.0 million. Grindr said on November 5 that its Average Paying Users rose 11% to 1.4 million.

Side by side, the filings show a change of order (our comparison). Hinge's 2.31 million Payers are ahead of the Bumble app's 1.99 million Paying Users. A year earlier, the Bumble app had 2.34 million and Hinge 1.87 million. In the second quarter, the Bumble app was still narrowly ahead, 2.08 million to 2.05 million. No single company reports that comparison, and each one counts differently, as the note below explains.

What each company says is happening

Match Group's total Payers fell 5% and revenue fell 3% to $891 million. It stresses a turn at Tinder, whose Direct Revenue fell 2% to $480 million: daily active users rose on a year earlier in September, the first such rise in three and a half years, the company says, and the Payers decline was a point smaller than in the second quarter. At Hinge, Direct Revenue rose 19% to $221 million while revenue per payer fell 3%, which Match Group attributes to discounts and tests of a cheaper subscription tier.

Bumble's revenue fell to $207.1 million from $246.2 million, about 15.9% (our calculation), mainly because of fewer paying users. The company says it has finished what it calls a quality reset of its membership and is now focused on improving the member experience, and it warns that revenue and paying users “have been, and may continue to be, negatively impacted in the short term.” It says it began a planned acceleration of marketing in the third quarter.

Grindr's revenue rose 22% to $141 million and its monthly revenue per paying user rose 10%. It raised its 2026 revenue guidance to $560 million and plans to launch Edge, a premium AI tier, on November 17. Grindr reported a $7 million net loss, including a $33 million charge for a U.K. litigation settlement that it says arose from data practices before 2020, under earlier owners and management.

Bumble's count may not stay public

Bumble agreed on October 12 to be acquired by Ithaca Holdings for $6.05 a share in cash, a deal it values at $1.3 billion and describes as a premium of about 138% to its unaffected share price on October 9. Affiliates of Blackstone and founder Whitney Wolfe Herd approved it by written consent, and it still needs regulatory approvals and other closing conditions. After closing, the company will be privately held and its stock will stop trading, so this may be one of the last public counts of Bumble's paying users (our inference).

Who earns most from each payer

The per-payer figures show why a smaller app can matter. Hinge's revenue per payer of $31.81 a month is higher than the Bumble app's $28.02, Grindr's $27.15 and Tinder's $18.02. Grindr's figure covers app-based revenue only. Each figure divides by that company's own payer count, so the ranking is a rough guide (our reading). As a result, Hinge's $221 million in Direct Revenue was well above the $167.3 million in Bumble App Revenue, though both remain far below Tinder's $480 million.